Global Water Crisis Coming to a Boil

Water, a resource that is often taken for granted, is now a hot-button issue as economic growth and rising standards of living lead water usage to outpace the world’s supply.

“Shortages are reaching crisis proportions in even the most highly developed regions, and they’re quickly becoming commonplace in our own backyard,” reports Wired magazine. Several regions of the U.S. are already dealing with shortages, and the summer ahead will mean water-saving measures for some states.

In Wisconsin, water has become a visible issue as state lake levels decline. Residents of Georgia will have to continue to conserve water as the state enters year three of a historic drought in the southeast region. And California faces its worst shortage in decades this summer due to record dry weather.

As supplies dwindle and demand grows, water is becoming “the next oil,” warns Massachusetts Institute of Technology Professor Sarah Slaughter.

Developing countries have long been familiar with shortages, and conditions are likely to worsen in the future. MSN reports that violent altercations recently broke out over water in Delhi, where several areas of the city have not received water since last week.

According to the World Water Council, 1.1 billion people in the world live without clean drinking water, while 2.6 billion people lack adequate sanitation.

Wired magazine examines the water troubles of three different regions. It warns that the world is approaching “peak water, the point at which the renewable supply is forever outstripped by unquenchable demand.” Aquifers under Beijing, Delhi, Bangkok, and other major urban areas are drying up, and major rivers such as the Ganges, Jordan, Nile, and Yangtze are dwindling.

Wisconsin residents are more worried about water issues than about global warming, according to a poll by the University of Wisconsin Survey Center. The poll found that the declining water levels of lakes, rivers, streams and groundwater are the biggest environmental concern, and that 43 percent of people questioned say that declining water levels in state waterways are extremely or quite problematic. Water has become a visible issue in the state as lake levels have declined in recent years.

Water conditions in Georgia are beginning to normalize after two years of historic drought, reports the Atlanta Journal Constitution. “This year has just been a year of awareness for me, said Gay Arnieri, a Sierra Club member. “I can’t imagine not worrying about water anymore.”

Clayton County in Georgia has created a unique water treatment system that uses manmade wetlands to help filter waste water. The community hasn’t worried about the one of the most severe droughts in the Southeast on record.

Residents of Delhi, India, are becoming “angry and desperate,” according to an MSN report, which said that areas in the west, southwest, north, northwest and outer Delhi have not received water since last week.

Cyclone-ravaged Myanmar is suffering from the contamination of its drinking water. Houses that use electricity to pump water will suffer a “huge water shortage,” said Jyri Rantanen of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

The BBC has a map highlighting the world’s water problem regions, such as the polluted Yellow River in China, the Zambezi river basin in southern Africa—one of the most overused river systems in the world—and Mexico City, which is sinking due to the water being pumped out from beneath its foundation.

The world’s population tripled in the 20th century, and will increase by another 40–50 percent in the next 50 years, according to the World Water Council, which provides an overview of the global water crisis. The organization says that population growth, along with industrialization and urbanization, will increase the world’s need for water and have serious consequences on the environment.